Tom-All-Alone's - Hardcover

Lynn Shepherd

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1780331665 ISBN 13: 9781780331669

Publisher: Corsair, 2012

Synopsis

London, 1850. Fog in the air and filth in the streets, from the rat-infested graveyard of Tom-All-Alone's to the elegant chambers in Lincoln's Inn Fields, where the formidable lawyer Edward Tulkinghorn has powerful clients to protect, and a deadly secret to hide. Only that secret is now under threat from a shadowy and unseen adversary - an adversary who must be tracked down at all costs, before it's too late. Who better for such a task than young Charles Maddox? Unfairly dismissed from the police force, Charles is struggling to establish himself as a private detective. Only business is slow and his one case a dead end, so when Tulkinghorn offers a handsome price for an apparently simple job Charles is unable to resist. But as he soon discovers, nothing here is what it seems. An assignment that starts with anonymous letters leads soon to a brutal murder, as the investigation lures Charles ever deeper into the terrible darkness Tulkinghorn will stop at nothing to conceal. Inspired by Charles Dickens' masterpiece Bleak House, Tom-All-Alone's is a new and gripping Victorian murder mystery which immerses the reader in a grim London underworld that Dickens could only hint at - a world in which girls as young as ten work the night as prostitutes, unwanted babies are ruthlessly disposed of, and those who threaten the rank and reputations of great men are eliminated at once, and without remorse.

About this title

Review:

A necessary eye for squalor, meticulous research and deft plotting, as well as the ability to handle the difficult God's-eye-view narration with aplomb...you'll be guaranteed to enjoy. (The Guardian)

It s a highly compelling, immaculately written 19th-century murder mystery. (Independent on Sunday)

A grisly period detective story with a light-hearted literary conceit (The Times)

An intelligent, gripping and beautifully written novel which sparkles with bibliophilic glee (The Scotsman)

Beautifully written..Shepherd has perfectly caught the tone of voice, ranging from the lawyer Tulkinghorn to Esther Summerson and Inspector Bucket, and describes the horrors of nineteenth century slums more candidly than any Victorian novelist ever could...an absorbing read (Literary Review)

I can think of no better way to celebrate the bicentenary of the birth of Charles Dickens than to recommend Tom-All-Alone's. This terrific Victorian mystery begins in dense fog, like Bleak House, and has an unemployed detective reluctantly obeying a summons to the rat-infested London churchyard of Tom-All-Alone's. The corpse of a newborn baby awaits him, marking the start of a case whose Dickensian horros are twinned with a sophisticated understanding of nature of sexual predation. (Joan Smith The Sunday Times)

Book Description:

Tom-All-Alone's is a dark and gripping Victorian murder mystery, immersing the reader in a grim London underworld.

About this edition

• Publisher: Corsair
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1780331665
• ISBN 13: 9781780331669
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 336